57. Can People from All Backgrounds Practise Yoga?
Yoga Studies in Five Minutes - Theodora Wildcroft
Jens U. Augspurger [+]
Jens U. Augspurger is a PhD Candidate at the Department of Religions and Philosophies at SOAS, University of London. His research and teaching focus on modern transnational yoga and spiritual movements, as well as their respective intersections with politics. Jens is also a recovering yoga teacher and the co-founder of Project SATYA, a community movement that supports survivors of sexualised violence and advocates for accountability and truth in the yoga industry. Considering spiritual tourism as a journey for self-discovery, Jens’ ethnographic dissertation project explores yoga tourism in India and the complex
relationships the yoga tourist builds while journeying (towards) the destination.
Description
In transnational yoga, both the invocation of meaning through historical context and the full de-contextualisation of the practice from its South Asian roots are both effective business strategies rather than positions that reflect historical veracity or post-colonialism. Yoga’s embedded injustices not only concern who practises and where they practise but also how and in what form.